also the catch weight that manny made cotto fight him at slightly taints the fight for me

Agreed. That was horrible. It reminds me of when Ray Leonard went from his 147 max weigh-in against Green, then came in at 145 against Duran. Duran beat a very weight-drained fighter, despite the fact that no catchweight was asked for. Leonard was much larger than Cotto, so he must have been almost dead. How he went fifteen rounds, I'll simply never know.